This book analyses a selection of leading works in the criminal law to ask questions about how the modern discipline of criminal law has developed, how it has been deployed in colonial and postcolonial contexts, and how criminal law scholarship has engaged with traditionally marginalised perspectives such as feminism, queer theory, and anti-carceral and abolitionist movements. The works analysed range from Macaulay’s Indian Penal Code (1837) to more recent textbooks and monographs on criminal law, and their jurisdictional reach extends to India, Canada, Australia, Malawi, the UK and the USA. The contributing authors include scholars, activists and legal practitioners, each of whom explores the intellectual development and geographical reach of Anglocriminal law via the work they analyse. Across the collection, the editors and contributors address the question of what it means to be a leading work in criminal law. The book will be a valuable resource for students, academics and researchers working in the area of criminal law.

Modern Histories of Crime and Punishment showcases a variety of disciplinary, methodological, and theoretical approaches that, taken together, contribute to our understanding of the history of criminal law. The book features work done by historians, lawyers, theorists, and sociologists on the history of criminal law and highlights how this multidisciplinary scholarship can help to frame critical analysis in the study and teaching of modern criminal law. As Modern Histories makes clear, the historical analysis of crime and punishment is not a freestanding inquiry into a distinct institution or body of legal doctrine, but in the end amounts to a daunting, yet exhilarating, venture into the webs of governance and control that constitute social and political life.

This book examines the relationship between legal tradition and national identity to offer a critical and historical perspective on the study of criminal law. Developing a radically different approach to questions of responsibility and subjectivity, it combines appreciation of the institutional and historical context in which criminal law is practiced with an informed understanding of the law itself. Drawing on original research into the development of Scottish criminal justice, it offers the first full-length critique of modern criminal law theory.

This book is a critical and historical study of the theory of criminal law which examines, in particular, the relationship between legal tradition and national identity, while developing a radically new approach to questions of responsibility and subjectivity. Previous studies have focused either on the philosophical bases of the criminal law or on the sociology and social history of crime, but there has been little exchange between the two. Lindsay Farmer's is one of the first extended attempts to draw on both fields in order to analyse the body of theorising about the criminal law as a whole. It displays a rare knowledge of the legal, institutional and historical contexts in which criminal law is practised, in combination with an informed understanding of the law itself. Dr Farmer uses contemporary social theory to develop an account of the relationship between legal practice and national culture in Scotland, analysing the belief in the distinctive spirit or 'genius' of Scots law. An exploration of the boundary between national limits and the universal aspirations of criminal law theory reveals the specifically modern characteristics of the criminal law and exposes how contemporary criminal law theory fundamentally misrepresents the character of modern criminal justice.

Modern Histories of Crime and Punishment showcases a variety of disciplinary, methodological, and theoretical approaches that, taken together, contribute to our understanding of the history of criminal law. The book features work done by historians, lawyers, theorists, and sociologists on the history of criminal law and highlights how this multidisciplinary scholarship can help to frame critical analysis in the study and teaching of modern criminal law. As Modern Histories makes clear, the historical analysis of crime and punishment is not a freestanding inquiry into a distinct institution or body of legal doctrine, but in the end amounts to a daunting, yet exhilarating, venture into the webs of governance and control that constitute social and political life.

Can traditional approaches to criminal jurisdiction adapt to the new global reality of the digital era? In this innovative book, leading experts in criminal, international and internet law unite to address this fundamental question. They consider how jurisdictional regimes are orientated around concepts of territoriality and extraterritoriality, how these categories are increasingly blurred in the digital era, and how a range of jurisdictional transformations are occurring in the process. Part I presents novel doctrinal, empirical and theoretical perspectives on criminal jurisdiction, exploring how states are shaping and reimagining jurisdictional concepts in the crafting and interpretation of criminal offences, and the ramifications of increasing jurisdictional concurrency in state practice. Part II focuses on the investigative and enforcement powers of the state to assess how these issues are transforming traditional understandings of jurisdictional rules and boundaries, the challenges and opportunities that these present for law enforcement authorities, and the sorts of constraints and safeguards that may be necessary as a result. The picture that emerges is a world of jurisdictional rules in a state of flux, which demands the diversity of legal perspectives presented in this book for documenting, rationalising and moving beyond the transformations that are taking shape in modern statecraft.

The criminal trial is under attack. Traditional principles have been challenged or eroded; in England and Wales the right to trial by jury has been restricted and rules concerning bad character evidence, double jeopardy and the right to silence have been substantially altered to "rebalance" the system in favour of victims. In the pursuit of security, particularly from terrorism, the right to a fair trial has been denied to some altogether. In fact trials have for a long time been an infrequent occurrence, most criminal convictions being the consequence of a guilty plea. Moreover, while this very public struggle over the future of the criminal trial is conducted, there is also a less publicly observed controversy about the significance of trials in modern society. Trials are under normative attack, their value being doubted by those who seek different kinds of process - conciliatory or restorative - to address the needs of victims and move away from the imposition of state power through trials and punishments. This book seeks to develop a normative theory of the criminal trial as a way of defending the importance of trials in our criminal justice system. The trial, it is suggested, calls defendants to answer a charge and, if they are criminally responsible, to account for their conduct. The trial is seen as a communicative process through which the defendant can challenge claims of wrongdoing made against him, including the norms in the light of which those claims are made. The book develops this communicative theory by first making a careful study of the history of trials, before moving on to outline the theory, which is then developed through chapters looking at the practices and principles of trials, alternative regulatory models, the roles of participants, the relationship between investigation and trial and trials as public fora.

What are the aims of a criminal trial? What social functions should it perform? And how is the trial as a political institution linked to other institutions in a democratic polity? What follows if we understand a criminal trial as calling a defendant to answer to a charge of criminal wrongdoing and, if he is judged to be responsible for such wrongdoing, to account for his conduct? A normative theory of the trial, an account of what trials ought to be and of what ends they should serve, must take these central aspects of the trial seriously; but they raise a number of difficult questions. They suggest that the trial should be seen as a communicative process: but what kinds of communication should it involve? What kind of political theory does a communicative conception of the trial require? Can trials ever actually amount to more than the imposition of state power on the defendant? What political role might trials play in conflicts that must deal not simply with issues of individual responsibility but with broader collective wrongs, including wrongs perpetrated by, or in the name of, the state? These are the issues addressed by the essays in this volume. The third volume in this series, in which the four editors of this volume develop their own normative account, will be published in 2007.

This collection of essays honours the work of Sir Gerald Gordon CBE QC LLD (1929-). In modern times few, if any, individuals can have been as important to a single country's criminal law as Sir Gerald has been to the criminal law of Scotland. His monumental work The Criminal Law of Scotland (1967) is the foundation of modern Scottish criminal law and is recognised internationally as a major contribution to academic work on the subject. Elsewhere, he has made significant contributions as an academic, judge and as a member of the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission. Reflecting the academic rigour and practical application of Sir Gerald's work, this volume includes essays on criminal law theory, substantive law and evidence and procedure by practitioners and academics within and outside of Scotland, including contributions from England, Ireland and the USA. Key Features: *chapters encompass a broad range of subjects of contemporary interest and significance *both substantive and procedural criminal law *contributors from practitioners and academics from both within and outwith Scotland, reflecting the influence and recognition afforded to Sir Gerald's work.

The trial is central to the institutional framework of criminal justice. It provides the procedural link between crime and punishment, and is the forum in which both guilt and innocence and sentence are determined. Its continuing significance is evidenced by the heated responses drawn by recent government proposals to reform rules of criminal procedure and evidence so as to alter the status of the trial within the criminal justice process and to limit the role of the jury. Yet for all of the attachment to trial by jury and to principles safeguarding the right to a fair trial there has been remarkably little theoretical reflection on the meaning of fairness in the trial and criminal procedure, the relationship between rules of evidence, procedure and substantive law, or the functions and normative foundations of the trial process. There is a need, in other words, to develop a normative understanding of the criminal trial. The book is based on the proceedings of two workshops which took place in 2003, addressing the theme of Truth and Due Process in the Criminal Trial. The essays in the book are concerned with the question of whether, and in what sense, we can take the discovery of truth to be the central aim of the procedural and evidential rules and practices of criminal investigation and trial. They are divided into four parts addressing distinct but inter-related issues: models of the trial (Duff, Matravers, McEwan); the meaning of due process (Gunther, Dubber); the meaning of truth and the nature of evidence (Jung, Pritchard); and legitimacy and rhetoric in the trial (Burns, Christodoulidis).